Daily History Challenge · No. 42 · Sunday 9 August 2026 · Gauntlet
Puzzle No. 42: Gauntlet
The Sunday Gauntlet: three before or after calls, four events to order and a final When? on Suez Crisis.
Act 1: Chain, against Kristallnacht Unleashes Nationwide Anti-Jewish Violence (1938 CE)
Before Kristallnacht Unleashes Nationwide Anti-Jewish Violence
Before Kristallnacht Unleashes Nationwide Anti-Jewish Violence
Before Kristallnacht Unleashes Nationwide Anti-Jewish Violence
Act 2: Order, earliest first
Act 3: When?
On 26 July 1956 Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser announced the nationalisation of the Suez Canal Company, asserting Egyptian sovereignty over the strategic waterway and intending to fund the Aswan High Dam after Western financing was withdrawn. Britain and France, the canal's main shareholders and users, secretly colluded with Israel: Israeli forces invaded the Sinai on 29 October 1956, and Anglo-French troops landed at Port Said on 5 to 6 November under the pretext of separating the combatants. Although the invaders achieved military success, the operation collapsed under intense international pressure. The United States, opposed to the action, threatened financial measures against Britain, while the Soviet Union issued threats and the United Nations demanded a ceasefire, which took effect on 7 November. Anglo-French forces withdrew by December and Israel evacuated Sinai by March 1957. The crisis was a humiliation that exposed the limits of British and French imperial power, accelerated decolonisation, boosted Nasser's standing as a leader of Arab nationalism, and confirmed the United States and Soviet Union as the dominant powers in the region.